


To Play In The Dark

by MathConcepts



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Emotional Manipulation, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, M/M, Multi, Other, Psychological Torture, Rape Roleplay, This is a study in fucked-up-ness
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-22
Updated: 2019-01-03
Packaged: 2019-08-28 09:31:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16720800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MathConcepts/pseuds/MathConcepts
Summary: Deep in the fortress of Angband, Mairon torments the wretched prisoners kept in Angband's depths.He does not torture with whips and physical pain, but by carefully planned, and staged acts of theatre and mind games.He disguises himself a prisoner, and dwells with the true prisoners, and Melkor often comes to him, and appears to abuse him most cruelly.The prisoners gain sympathy for Mairon, who is so beautiful, and who draws Melkor's horrid attention time after time.It is a wonderful game to Mairon, and a nightmare to the prisoners.





	1. Prisoner Mine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is the prologue, set up, excetera. The chapters will be fairly short.

 

 

 

* * *

  
  
The prisoners looked up with fearful eyes as the iron door of their prison was pulled open with a harsh grating of metal upon stone.  
  
  
Torches flickered beyond the arch of the doorway, an unstable light that outlined a slim figure in the doorway, backed by the black bodies of orc guards. The figure stumbled forward the next moment, propelled by a brutal push from one of the orcs, falling to its knees before the prisoners.

The orc who had shoved the figure stepped forward and deposited a torch in the clawed grate on the doorway's arch, then retreated, kicking the heavy iron door shut, and letting the bar that served to hold the door closed fall into place with a tremendous clang.

 

As soon as the footsteps of the orc guards had faded off, the prisoners turned their eyes to the figure crouched before them. Though they were imprisoned, in a horrible state, they still retained curiosity, or at the very least, fearful apprehension for forthcoming tortures.  
  
  
The figure remained kneeling, torso slumped forward over its knees, red-hued hair falling in curling strands over its shoulders, brushing the floor.

 

One of the prisoners stirred, chains clinking, and at this noise the figure lifted up its head, revealing  a pale, freckled face within the halo of hair, eyes the lightest amber, almost gold.  
  
Slowly the figure straightened, brushing its hair away from its face, and over one shoulder with a slender hand that trembled, showing a delicately pointed ear.

 

 _Elf_. This being was an elf then, thought the prisoners. Some of the prisoners were elves, some men, some spirits in physical form, but all were prisoners.  
  
  
The figure raised its eyes to the those of the prisoners, naked fear shining in their depths, echoing what was in the eye of every being in the large cell.

 

"Who...where...where am I?" the figure gasped out. Its voice was sweet, and pained, and above all fearful. The voice was scared, lost, and dripping in fear, but not yet broken, and sympathy sparked in the prisoners' hearts.

Soon, this one would be broken too.  
  
  
"You are here." one prisoner ventured in a coarse voice, the strongest of the prisoners, their self appointed spokesman when another joined their pitiful ranks. "And here is where you will stay until the worst befalls you." 

The figure's eyes squeezed shut, yet two tears escaped from the amber eyes.  
  
  
"Who are you?" the coarse voiced prisoner continued.

The figure's slender hand rose, dashing away the tears.

 

"I am an elvish noble...I was captured...a raid as I journeyed to see my kin..." the figure whispered softly.

 

"What is your name, if you remember it?" Coarse Voiced asked.

 

The figure looked at him sharply through the torch's flickering light.

"Why would I not remember my own name?"

 

"Many here do not remember. They have forgotten, or been made to forget by pain." Coarse Voiced explained. "Now, what then is your name?"

The sharpness bled from the figure's eyes, the shoulders slumping beneath the soiled silk robes the figure wore.

 

"Mairon. My name is _Mairon_." Mairon replied softly.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback is a nice thing for me. Just to let you know.


	2. Prisoner Thine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mairon establishes a rapport with the prisoners, and trouble comes knocking.

Mairon was a fretful sleeper, the prisoners soon discovered. He would toss on the hard stone floor of the large cell, no doubt accumulating bruises, and he would cry out in his sleep, plagued by nightmares of his kidnappers, the prisoners presumed. 

He slept with his eyes open, a thing that did not surprise the prisoners who were once elves, but unnerved the rest who were not.

The prisoners' rests were sporadic, as time was stagnant in their cell, measured only by the times when their orc guards saw fit to feed them, and replenish the single torch that burned on the doorway, and by this, the prisoners could guess Mairon had been with them for some three feeds.

On one such occasion, the prisoners had been fed, and they huddled close to the doorway, taking care to be within the circle of flickering torchlight, so as to have light to see and retrieve every crumb of their food that might fall.

Mairon sat with his back against the door itself, opposite the semi circle of prisoners, quietly eating. The food the prisoners had been given were chunks of roasted meat, though nobody dared speculate from what animal it came, it was freshly roasted, hot and tender, and it was consumed quickly.

 

Soon, there was not a scrap left, and a thick silence descended, broken suddenly by a shrill laugh.

The prisoners' eyes turned to Mairon, who the laugh had come from. Mairon was looking down at his hands, their fingertips glistened in the torchlight, coated in grease from the meat.

"I am not used to eating like this." Mairon admitted, his tone almost conversational, though it shook ever so slightly. "At my home, I eat with cutlery of silver and gold, on fine linen and crystal glasses..." his words trailed off, eyes squeezing shut as he wiped his fingers on the hem of his robe.  
  
  
The prisoners shared looks, none knowing how to respond.

"Everyone here once came from a place better than this." Coarse Voiced finally said.

Mairon's eyes snapped open, gleaming almost gold in the torchlight, a strange expression warping his face, as if he was remembering a thing he would rather not remember. 

  
"Yes...indeed. A place better than this." Mairon repeated.  


"You say you are an elf noble, why you not in that better place? How did you come to be captured?" Coarse Voiced suddenly questioned.  
  
  
"I was traveling to my kin, as I told you."  
  
  
"And you did not take a guard?"  
  
  
"I did, but good is a guard against a legion of orcs?"  


"Fair enough." Coarse Voiced conceded, shuffling to rest against the wall in a clink of chains, taking care to stay in the ring of torchlight.  


Mairon watched him with catlike consideration.  


"Where are you from?" Mairon asked, his fingers dancing over the embroidered patch on his hip of his robe, a nervous action the prisoners had seen him repeat. 

"I do not remember."  Coarse Voiced answered immediately.  
  
  
"Then _what_ are you? Elf? Man?" Mairon pressed.

  
Coarse Voiced shrugged.  
  
  
"I have forgotten that too."

 

"Show me your ears." Mairon demanded, leaning forward.  


Coarse Voiced grinned, hands raising and shoving aside the matted hair from either side of his face, revealing gnarled fringes of flesh where his ears had once been.  


"There they are. You aren't liable to get much information from them." Coarse Voiced informed.

 

Mairon's mouth twisted into something resembling a pout, and he sank back against the door, his fingers worrying at the tip of his own ear.   


"Will they take my ears?" he wondered aloud, tone no longer imperious, but wavering with fear.  


"Keep your head down, and you might escape the knife." Coarse Voiced advised, another grin showing his teeth.  


A sickly smile curved Mairon's lips in answer, and the torchlight glimmered on the tears that were slowly running down his freckled face.  


Coarse Voiced cleared his throat roughly, eyes flickering away from Mairon's face for a moment, before returning.

"Bring your face over here."

Mairon's brow arched suspiciously over his tear filled eyes.

 

"Whatever for?"

"So I can count the specks on your face." Coarse Voiced replied. "One does grow weary of counting the links of their chains, or whip marks."

A rather hysterical laugh bubbled from Mairon's throat, yet he obliging inclined his head towards Coarse Voiced, who noticed that his tears had stopped, a thing Coarse Voiced had intended.   
  
Coarse Voiced began to count, the numbers smooth on his tongue from so many previous usages, and the rest of the prisoners leaned in, eager for the new variation of their old, old game.  


Coarse Voiced had reached thirty when the door to the cell was flung open, Mairon barely having enough time to scramble from the radius of the door, backing away in terror towards the far wall with the rest of the prisoners, as a dark and terrible figure strode into the room.

  
" _Morgoth_." Mairon gasped out.

 

 

 


	3. Prisoner Fine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trouble comes and goes, and the game starts for real.

The black clothed figure strode forward, its brows inverting as it heard Mairon's voice speak the hated moniker of _Morgoth_. Dark eyes singled out Mairon from within the huddle of prisoners, and a dark hand waved, motioning Mairon forward. 

  
Mairon did not move, much to the prisoners's chagrin. It was a costly mistake to refuse a summons, and an even harsher mistake to refuse a summons from the Dark Lord himself.   
  
Dark eyes narrowed, a hiss of breath escaping from between tightly pressed lips.

"Come here, _elf_." Melkor growled, eyes flaring with anger.  
  
  
Mairon came forward haltingly, his steps measured and timed to prevent him from reaching Melkor too quickly.

The prisoners watched Mairon approach Melkor with bated breath.

"On your knees." Melkor ordered when Mairon drew near to him. Mairon's lips tightened, face paling.

"I will not kneel before you." Mairon spat.

"A pity." Melkor said, face twisting in anger, his hand flashing out with incalculable speed and capturing Mairon's arm, pulling Mairon in, to him. Mairon stumbled, and fell against Melkor's chest, immediately pushing away as if the contact burned.   
  
But Melkor held him fast, not allowing Mairon to back away more than a few inches. In the torchlight, the prisoners could see Mairon's body visibly trembling.

Melkor's eyes swept over Mairon, narrowing as they came to Mairon's face.  
  
  
"My captain tells me he took you as you journeyed to a military location." Melkor said. "I desire to know where this location might be."  
  
  
Mairon's lips tightened, a silent refusal, and Melkor's eyes brimmed with anger.  

"Tell me elf, where is the fortress that you were journeying to?" Melkor hissed. The prisoners prayed within the secrecy of their minds for Mairon to answer, for they had no wish to see the consequences that would fall upon him if he did not.

Thankfully, Mairon allowed his tonuge to loosen.

  
"I know nothing of this fortress. I had set out to visit my kin, when I was waylaid by your monsters." Mairon retorted.

Melkor growled, flicking his wrist in a powerful movement and sending Mairon sprawling to the stone floor on his back, at the feet of the other prisoners. Mairon connected with the hard ground, a painful expulsion of breath seeping from between his tightly clenched teeth.

 

Melkor advanced on Mairon, and the prisoners gave way, leaving Mairon to Melkor's whims. It would not do to interfere with any interrogation of Melkor's, the prisoners had all learned this over the course of hard lived years in Angband's depth. Should they try to protect Mairon, they would accomplish nothing besides bringing themselves and Mairon more pain.

 Melkor towered over Mairon's shaking figure, and the large cell suddenly seemed small, too small. Mairon attempted to rise, but Melkor's foot came down upon him, bearing its weight onto his belly, holding him pinned to the floor.  


"It would be wise to tell me." Melkor said, his tones calm, but a certain hint of promised malice lining them.

 

"I will not." Mairon gasped, struggling feebly under the weight of Melkor's foot. A certain light came into Melkor's eyes as the Vala watched Mairon squirm under his crushing pressure, and the prisoners drew in sharp breaths. They all knew that look, though none of them had witnessed it upon Melkor's face.  


It was a scheming look of lustful dark intent, promising an acute type of suffering. Mairon however, could not be expected to recognize this look, for he had not been a prisoner as long as they had, and he merely returned Melkor's gaze with one of fear and anger.  


 

Melkor's foot withdrew from atop Mairon, and quickly Mairon rose to his feet, backing away from Melkor, clutching his robes to him. Melkor merely laughed, the sound harsh and grating upon the prisoners ears, the fingers of one charred hand extending, brushing the side of Mairon's face, curling about his jaw, then moving away.  
  
  
"I will be back, elf. Construct a a more pleasing reply in my absence."  Melkor said threateningly, then turned and in a swirl of black, strode out of the cell, pulling the iron door shut on his heels.  

As soon as the lock of the door fell into place with a resounding crash of metal, Mairon fell to his knees in a crumple of silk, backing himself against the wall. The prisoners watched him with eyes burdened by understanding, though it fell to Coarse Voiced to offer a modicum of comfort to the distraught Mairon.  


Coarse Voiced seated himself beside Mairon, his gnarled hand clumsily patting over the wide swath of silken fabric that covered Mairon's arm.

 

"Don't you cry now, or throw a fit." Coarse Voiced warned, noting the tears that pooled in Mairon's eyes and heaves of his chest. "It will bring you nothing but a beating, and you should much rather save your strength for what is to come."

Mairon wrapped his arms about his bruising torso, letting his tears fall, though he showed no signs of throwing a fit, to Coarse Voiced's relief.  
  
  
"What will come?" Mairon questioned in shaky tones, and was rewarded with a bitter smile.  
  
  
"It is best not to think upon it." Coarse Voiced said.


End file.
